Pages

Monday, February 18, 2019

A few titles were delayed last year at various stages for various reasons. I now announce them both. First is Sphinx, by David Lindsay, for which I wrote a new Introduction.

In Sphinx (1923), Nicholas Cabot has come
to a country-house called Mereway where he plans to work on a machine he has
invented that records dreams. He encounters a family with three marriageable daughters,
and takes refuges from them in the company of some neighbors, including the
calculating Celia Hantish and the well-known composer Lore Jensen, who has
written a tune called “Sphinx" which hints at the riddle of existence.
Meanwhile as Cabot experiments with his machine, he finds that dreams give
access to a deeper meaning of life.

Next is The Cult Murders, by Leonard Cline, writing as Alan Forsyth. This is the first of Cline's three pseudonymous pulp thrillers, written while he was in jail for manslaughter. To be fair, Cline didn't think much of his pulp writing, and it is negligible in comparison with Cline's serious literary work under his own name. But that doesn't mean that his pulp-writing is without interest or merit. The Cult Murders concerns a Devil worshiping cult set up to fleece rich women of their fortunes. Originally serialized in 1928, this is the first appearance in book form.